North Korea makes nuclear threat over military drills

North Korea denounced upcoming joint South Korean and U.S. military drills and said it would “wipe out” the countries with nuclear weapons if they threatened the communist state, its KCNA news agency said on Sunday.

South Korean and U.S. forces on Monday start joint computer simulation and communication drills that come in the wake of rare conciliatory moves by Pyongyang, which this month released two U.S. journalists and a South Korean worker it had held captive.

North Korea regularly denounces joint drills as a preparation for invasion and nuclear war.

“Should the U.S. imperialists and the Lee Myung-bak group threaten the DPRK (North Korea) with nukes, it will retaliate against them with nukes,” KCNA quoted a military official as saying. Lee Myung-bak is South Korea’s president.